Straight from Dallas and on to Ontario — I’ll be talking later in the week on the theme, “What comes next?” — taking a look at trends involving hyper competition – constant, relentless change – rapid innovation – increasing market risk – the emerging skills shortage – and the exit of ‘boomers’ — for clients of Fibrewired, a leading provider of hi-end data and networking services. [ link ]
Upcoming keynote in Dallas — Keys to Innovation
I’ll be doing a short keynote and running a panel of customers of SAP, on the theme “Keys to Innovation” in Dallas, TX next Tuesday. I’ll be helping the panelists put into perspective the critical business strategies and governance issues that they have used to prepare their organizations for business in the 21st century.
“…soon hundreds of people were using Mr. Carroll’s machine to surf anonymously”
In today’s Globe: “Jim Carroll was stunned when Rogers Cable told him it had received a complaint that a hacker was using his Internet address.” 
(PDF)
I wrote about this situation earlier here. And a year ago, my Profit magazine column noted that there were some big board/insurance issues emerging.
An upcoming column of mine notes that infrastructure issues are probably the next corporate Sarbanes-Oxley
What’s the future for intelligence?
I’ll be keynoting the closing lunch tomorrow at the 14th Annual Canadian Conference on Intelligent Systems. It’s a very august crowd of PhD’s, researchers, academics and scientists. I can’t tell them much about the future that they don’t already know — so I will talk about this:
“In his keynote presentation, futurist, innovation and trends expert Jim Carroll provides critical insight into the deep relationship between the “big issues” of the next 10 years and intelligent systems. He’ll provide a clear link between the major demographic, social, business, cultural, economic, mployment and technological trends that come next — and will relate these to the practical intelligent system research and development occurring today. He
will deliver unique insight into the challenges that face the industry as it goes moves from an era of research and development to a time of implementation — and what the industry must do to address the potentially significant cultural, social and political barriers that can stand in the way of success.”
Keynote overview – “Bridging a Path to the Future”
“If you’re not taking risks in your company and career, you probably aren’t adding much value. That was the bottom-line message of futurist Jim Carroll, who delivered the closing general session address on Wednesday to the Professional Forum of the Industrial Asset Management Council ….. Carroll discussed 10 trends that are shaping the future of the global economy.”
Keynote Topic:
Think Big, Start Small, Scale Fast:
Aligning Yourself for the Era of Acceleration
We’re faced with deep and complex issues involving the environment, health care, water and food. At the same time, every industry is faced with upheaval and disruption. In this context, every industry is being redefined at blinding speed by technology, globalization, the rapid emergence of new competitors, new forms of collaborative global R&D, and countless other challenges! The speed with which these changes occur are now being increasingly driven by the arrival of a younger, more entrepreneurial generation; a group that seems determined to change the world to reflect their ideas and concept of opportunity. They’ve grown up networked, wired, and are collaborative in ways that no previous generation seems to be.
And therein lies the challenge.
Most organizations are bound up in tradition, process, certain defined ways of doing things — rules — that have helped them succeed in the past. Over time, they have developed a corporate culture which might have worked at the slower paced world of the past — but now has them on the sick-bed, suffering from an organizational sclerosis that clogs up their ability to try to do anything new. Those very things which worked for them in the past might be the anchors that could now hold them back as the future rushes at them with ever increasing speed. They are being challenged in a fundamental way by those who think big, and by some really big, transformative trends.
How to cope with accelerating change? In this keynote, Jim outlines his simple but transformative structure : Think big, start small and scale fast! The new model for going forward in the era of accelerating change involves aligning yourself to the big opportunities of today through bold, transformative thinking; the small scale steps that you can take today to align yourself to this future, and focusing on a culture of speed and agility that can help you to get there at the right tim!
In this riveting keynote, Jim Carroll covers the major trends and opportunities that come from “thinking big, starting small, and scaling fast,” by addressing some of the fundamental changes that are underway. It’s based on his forthcoming book of the same name.
Article – Will Sarbanes Oxley Kill Innovation?
Will the intense focus on governance and compliance issues in the wake of major scandal somehow force many organizations to throw the innovation baby out with the bath water? It may inhibit a board’s ability to focus on risk taking and long term value creation. And once risk and innovation are removed from the board table, it will soon disappear from the rest of the organization as well. Read my latest article on this topic: 
(PDF)
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